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‘Oh, he had to take care of something. Don’t worry. He’ll be back.’
The two ladies lapsed into silence for a while, concentrating on that ladylike art of not speaking with your mouth full which I had never entirely mastered. Mr Ambrose took the opportunity to lean over towards me and hiss, in a voice hardly audible over the clatter of knives and forks: ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Whatever do you mean?’ I blinked up at him in the manner of the perfectly innocent little maiden. ‘I’ve been here all along.’
Lightning flashed in his storm-coloured eyes. ‘What are you doing here…like that?’
‘Eating breakfast, you mean?’
‘Mr Linton, I-!’
‘Say, Miss Linton,’ the marchioness said, unaware that she was interrupting, ‘I didn’t hear your carriage arrive. Did you arrive on horseback, in this cold weather?’
‘Oh no.’ I gave her a bright smile. ‘I walked.’
The eyes of the two women went wide. ‘Walked?’
‘Oh yes.’ My smile widening, I gestured out over the white wasteland, stretching as far as the eye could see beyond the windows of the winter garden. ‘A nice little walk is just the thing to warm one up, isn’t it?’
Under the table, Mr Ambrose stomped on my foot. Or at least he tried to. I was prepared now, evaded him easily and kicked right back. This was fun!
‘Um…Miss Linton?’ The marchioness regarded me with a mixture of awe and doubt. In the eyes of her young daughter, however, I could see the beginning glimmers of hero worship. ‘Where exactly do you live?’
I reached for a piece of toast and started to butter it. ‘London. Why?’
‘Um…nothing.’ She regarded me, then her son, and the way he was still leaning towards me. Immediately, Mr Ambrose jerked back into a ramrod straight position. ‘Where exactly do you know my son from, Miss Linton? Through your brother?’
‘No.’ I glanced at Mr Ambrose out of the corner of my eyes and sent him a brief smile that made him sit even straighter. ‘I was fortunate enough to be at a ball at Lady Metcalf’s one evening, when your son arrived and demanded my hand for the next dance.’
‘Demanded?’
‘Oh yes. I declined at first, but he insisted.’
Adaira’s eyes went wide. ‘You said no to my brother?’
‘Oh yes.’
Her eyes gleamed - definitely hero worship!
‘But he simply wouldn’t give up so, in the end…’ I shrugged. ‘I gave him a chance. It would have been a bit cruel, letting him beg.’
‘He was that interested, was he?’ Lady Samantha’s eyes gleamed as they gazed at me. I knew that expression. It was the same my aunt had on her face every time she caught sight of an eligible bachelor. She beamed. ‘You know, I’m really so very glad you came, Miss Linton! You must stay for the whole holiday season.’
‘Could I really? Oh, I would be delighted.’
Under the table, Mr Ambrose’s foot found mine, and pressed down, hard. Out of the corner of his mouth, he growled, too low for anybody else to hear: ‘You will pay for this later.’
‘Will I?’ I batted my eyelashes up at him. ‘In pounds sterling?’
Quick as a flash, so quick that even the eagle’s eye of a mother could not detect it, his hand darted under the table and took hold of my thigh possessively. His fingers were like iron vices wrapped in velvet. ‘Oh no. I had another currency in mind.’
The marchioness cleared her throat. ‘You know, Adaira…I think I forgot something up in my room.’
‘Really, Mother? What?’
‘I can’t remember what exactly, but it’s something really, really important.’ Rising swiftly to her feet, she started backing towards the door, her eyes never leaving me and Mr Ambrose. ‘Yes, really, really important. I hope you don’t mind, Miss Linton. I’ll just have to leave you alone with my son here for a little bit, while I go fetch…whatever it is I have to fetch.’
‘Well, you go and get it, then,’ Adaira told her mother, not moving an inch. She was watching me and Mr Ambrose, too, with quite a lot of interest gleaming in her eyes. ‘I’ll stay here.’
